by Web Editor | Oct 24, 2018 | News
From October 21-27, 2018, we celebrate the value of America’s forests and recognize how vital they are to our well-being and national prosperity during National Forest Products Week. This week is recognized each year by a Presidential proclamation. At the USDA Forest Service, we work year round to create new opportunities for wood products that contribute to diversified rural economies and support sustainable forest management.
By supporting forest products markets, we have the opportunity to create safer communities by reducing wildfire risk, supporting rural economic development, and contributing to a more sustainable building sector. The Forest Service is working to develop the U.S. market for cross-laminated timber, or CLT, and other mass timber technologies.
CLT is a made from several layers of dried lumber boards stacked in alternating directions, glued and pressed to form rectangular panels. These panels have exceptional strength and stability and can be used as floors, walls and roofs in building construction, replacing or used along with traditional building materials such as concrete and steel. In fact, the International Code Council is examining whether or not tall wood buildings up to 18 stories will be included in the 2021 International Building Code. A final decision will be made later this year.
The state of Oregon has already adopted the proposed provisions for the International Code Council under its Statewide Alternate Method, and Washington State legislation already embraces mass timber construction. The U.S. Department of Defense is already using CLT in some of its on-base housing because of the incredible resiliency of the materials and their resistance to explosive forces.
We are on the precipice of major momentum in the marketplace with mass timber, with four factories in production, including two making architectural grade CLT; five factories coming online (either under construction or just completed); and three more factories recently announced in eight states. Compounded with the upcoming code decisions, we expect to see many more mass timber and CLT buildings in the near future.
From the USDA: https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2018/10/22/forest-service-celebrates-cross-laminated-timber-during-forest-products-week
by Web Editor | May 4, 2018 | News
The International Code Council’s (ICC) Committee Action Hearings in Columbus, Ohio, have concluded with a clear endorsement of building codes that will enable the use of mass timber technologies in buildings ranging up to 18 stories. Though taller mass timber buildings are currently being built under various local codes, this move by the ICC ensures that model code provisions will be available to many more building officials.
Mass timber structures are generally built with large panels made of cross-laminated timber (CLT), nail-laminated timber (NLT), glue-laminated timber (Glulam) or structural composite lumber (SCL). The greater availability of CLT has provided new options for builders.
“The strength and fire resistance performance of mass timber structures is well understood and supported by substantial testing and data,” said Stephen DiGiovanni, P.E., Chair of the ICC’s Ad Hoc Committee on Tall Wood Buildings and fire protection engineer for the Clark County (NV) Department of Building and Fire Prevention. “As taller mass timber buildings become more widely deployed, it’s important that the International Building Code and the entire family of I-Codes remains at the forefront of emerging construction technologies, and continues to provide building and fire code officials with the tools they need to ensure the safety of the public and first responders.”
All buildings under the International Building Code (IBC) must meet specified fire performance standards, whether built of steel, concrete or mass timber. The 14 code provisions passed out of the ICC Committee Action Hearing established new fire resistance standards and procedures for mass timber that are more rigorous than comparable steel and concrete structures.
From Civil+Structural Engineer: https://csengineermag.com/code-officials-move-update-ibc-tall-mass-timber-buildings/
by Web Editor | Jan 5, 2018 | News
Learning From Europe And Canada’s Timber Building Industry
If the steady stream of newly announced mass wood projects is any indication, mass timber building technologies are poised to take the American construction and design industries by storm over the next few years. As products like cross-laminated timber (CLT), nail-laminated timber (NLT), glue-laminated timber (glulam), and dowel-laminated timber (DLT) begin to make their way into widespread use, designers, engineers, and builders alike are searching for the best—and sometimes, most extreme—applications for mass timber technologies. But rather than reinvent the wheel, American designers can look to experienced mass timber designers in Europe and Canada for key lessons as they begin to test the limits of these materials in the United States.
European and Canadian architects and researchers have long been at the forefront of mass timber design, starting with early experiments in the 1970s. By the 1990s, researchers like Julius K. Natterer at the Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, Switzerland, were developing initial CLT prototypes. Natterer’s work has been buttressed by that of many others, including research performed at the Norwegian Institute of Wood Technology under Thomas Orskaug and experiments conducted at the Technical University of Munich under Stefan Winter.
One key lesson European timber projects teach is that when it comes to structural systems, weight matters. On average, mass timber assemblies weigh between one-third and one-fifth as much as concrete structures, despite equivalent structural capacities. As a result, mass timber buildings are much lighter than concrete ones, a positive for building in tricky urban situations, for example—where underground rail yards, subway tunnels, and municipal utilities place limits on how heavy and tall buildings can be.
London-based Waugh Thistleton Architects (WTA), for example, recently completed work on Dalston Lane, a 121-unit CLT midrise complex located above a tunnel serving the Eurostar train line in the city’s Hackney neighborhood.
For the project, the architects worked with timber-engineering specialists Ramboll to develop a stepped tower cluster rising between five and ten stories tall. CLT panels are used for the external, party, and core walls of the building, as well as the stairs and the building’s floors. The variegated massing is due directly to the architect’s use of CLT construction, which resulted in a lighter building that allowed the designers to build taller without more extensive foundations. The resulting building, with its staggered massing, better maximizes daylight infiltration into apartment units. The added height allowed the architects to add 50 more units to the project than originally permitted, a testament to just how light CLT can be.
From The Architects Newspaper: archpaper.com
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by Web Editor | Mar 29, 2017 | News
Over the past several years, there has been a rise in mass timber construction around the world, demonstrating the strength, stability, and design flexibility of next-generation lumber technologies. To help inform architects, engineers, developers, industry professionals, students and interested parties, reThink Wood has launched the reThink Wood Research Library to serve as the go-to industry resource for those seeking information on the latest advancements in wood’s performance and advantages in the built environment.
reThink Wood is a body of research hoping to push boundaries and shift perceptions about building with wood.
Today, mass timber technologies, including cross-laminated timber (CLT), nail laminated timber (NLT) and glued laminated timber (glulam), are gaining traction in the U.S. for mid-rise and tall wood structures. The publicly accessible and comprehensive reThink Wood Research Library will be frequently updated with the latest research on wood building products and systems worldwide, as well as demonstrate where research gaps currently exist.
“The future of mass timber in the U.S. is really starting to heat up,” said Lucas Epp, head of engineering at StructureCraft. “In the next few years, there will be considerably more mass timber buildings built than we have today. The industry is starting to see that this type of construction is fast, cost effective and sustainable.”
Advocates of CLT say it can be used to construct buildings of equal strength and fire-resistance as those made of steel and concrete. It has also fueled the passions of architects and environmentalists, who believe it to be a much greener method for housing the world’s growing population.
From Woodworking Network: https://www.woodworkingnetwork.com/news/woodworking-industry-news/wood-research-library-advances-timber-building-construction?ss=news,news,woodworking_industry_news,news,almanac_market_data,news,canadian_news
by Web Editor | Apr 17, 2015 | News
The American Wood Council has been awarded a $250,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to conduct research on the fire performance of mass timber buildings. AWC will partner with the National Fire Protection Association’s (NFPA) Fire Protection Research Foundation and the Property Insurance Research Group.
The AWC proposal is intended to advance the construction of taller wood buildings in the United States by demonstrating the fire performance of newer mass timber products. Over the last several years, tall wood buildings have been completed around the world using this new technology – including a 9-story building in London, 10-story in Prince George, Canada, and 14-story building now under construction in Bergen, Norway. These buildings have consistently demonstrated the successful application of mass timber technologies.
“Findings from this project will inform the building community and the insurance industry, providing an increased level of confidence in both the adequacy of this new construction type and when setting fire insurance premiums. This is a new method of construction to insurers, and in order to provide reasonable insurance coverage, they need to understand the performance of the material,” said AWC Vice President of Codes & Regulations Kenneth Bland. Increased use of wood in building construction also holds great promise for improved environmental impacts.
“Innovative mass timber wood products encourage sustainable forestry and capture large amounts of carbon, thereby reducing greenhouse emissions through both sequestration and the substitution of wood for more carbon-intensive products. The construction of tall wood buildings would put America at the forefront of an emerging global opportunity,” said AWC President & CEO Robert Glowinski.
When announcing the USDA 2015 Wood Innovations grant recipients, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said, “Working with our partners, the Forest Service is promoting deployment of new technologies, designed to support new market opportunities for wood energy and innovative wood building materials.”
From the American Wood Council: https://www.awc.org/NewsReleases/2015/newsreleases2015.php#20150415
